Memory of flesh
by Brokensword
Summary: Kirika and Chloe are at the manor. Only this time when Mireille comes Kirika doesn't regain her memories in time. I won't even try to put a pairing on this, but it's there.
1. Default Chapter

So after finishing my essay, I realized it was four AM and I was so hyped up on coffee that it was probably better just to kill time before class than attempt to sleep. So I was poking around, and saw a bunch of Chloe and Kirika fics and somehow got it into my head that this would be something I could write.

I feel the need to apologize for this one somehow so here's a warning: this is just odd, and definitely more cynical then I intended. And if you are looking for Chloe/Kirika happy fluffiness you will probably be disappointed, as I think I prove fairly well that I do not have the ability to write that.  
  
---

Skin she understands. Fist against fist, elbow to a cracking skull, that's all natural, and when she is moving it all falls into place. The thousand questions still burn in the secret boxes in her mind, but words can be forgotten, while flesh never forgets.  
  
Lips and the soft tips of fingers are harder. There more elusive, and the less harsh things tend to slip away. She doesn't quite understand the light brushes of a grinning smile against her own hard mouth, but it's okay because she doesn't need to. Flesh remembers, and responds where her mind won't. No different, really, than the automatic clenching of her fingers, or the tightening of her fist whenever that woman comes too close.  
  
Chloe. She remembers that name. It's the only one. She remembers "another me" and "my other half." The words are meaningless without a definition for "me" but Chloe whispers them to her at night so they must have meant something once.  
  
There was an echo of a voice once. It's foreign now, but it sends shivers of recognition through her as it whispers "Who am I." She can't remember why it's there and when she searches for answers all she finds are brown, open narrow eyes that pull her in. That may or may not have been the answer, but it's all she has. Being consumed isn't so bad since it at least means there is something left to take, so she pushes herself into the eyes, and into the arms, and the smell of blood is still there, but it's okay.  
  
When she looks into those eyes, she knows they are supposed to be her reflection.  
  
One night as she wanders the manor, simultaneously looking for the answers and avoiding them, she catches her reflection in the pond. It takes her several minutes to realize she's seeing herself, and once she realized it was in fact her, it had made the sight all the more confusing. No matter how many times she goes back to looks she sees nothing in her eyes.  
  
Chloe's sees two polished mirrors in her iris which reflect back everything she wants to see, and swallow everything that she doesn't. The other women, the nun, sees mechanical gears, twisting when she tells them too, remaining motionless and dead the rest of the time. Either way she's just a tool to be used.  
  
But she can't see anything.  
  
It doesn't matter though, because eventually Chloe will come for her, and push the metal back between her fingers, and then the world will make sense once again.  
  
Maybe they could have lasted that way forever, but she doesn't know because just when it all felt right, and she could almost remember who she was suppose to be, the other woman came and ruined it all.  
  
Blue, blue eyes. So searching, and she doesn't know what they were looking for, but they had seen straight into her. And when she looked back she almost saw something too. Almost remembered.  
  
It wasn't even a real memory.  
  
Just the momentary press of ghostly fingers against her face, and a shudder down her spine where pleasure had once crept up. Just an itching in her wrist, and the hazy vision of golden strands of hair brushing against it. The longer she waited, the more came back: the scent of baking bread, and taste green tea that she still hasn't quite forgotten. Friendly hands mussing her hair, strong fingers clenching against hers. Flesh remembers, and so she knew that once, in a different life, their skin had met.  
  
She wanted to scream then, because it was all close, just too close. And she felt the first emotion she could remember which was searing, burning rage at the woman who was trying to break her mind, and take her somewhere she's not.  
  
"But she was your friend," Chloe says when it is over, and all that remains is crimsons spots which she washes away, catching a reflection of black eyes in the water. She wonders what the blue eyed women had seen when she looked so close those last few minutes. She strains for several seconds, and there is a pressure growing in her head, and a ringing warning in her ears as if she is on the verge of something terrifying. That was the second emotion she can remember feeling, and she decided in that moment she was not looking forward to the third.  
  
"It doesn't matter," she says, and it's almost true.  
  
Chloe doesn't answer then, and she almost wishes she would, because as much as she doesn't like the meaningless, vague sound of the words, she suddenly hates the silence even more.  
  
When she does finally speak Chloe's voice is constant, old and known, as always. When she closes her eyes tight on late nights, when the world is quiet in slumber, she can hear the other voice of that other woman, the one that had been so familiar, that had lilted and sang with a thousand intricacies and intonations she can recall, that had spoken words she can't remember.  
  
Eventually it faded though. And as hard as she strained against the wind she could never catch anything more than her own heart beat.  
  
That at least was proof of life, even as the pounding echoed empty across her body. Even if it hadn't been there was nothing else for her to do except return the other her, to Chloe's brown eyes, and whispering voice.  
  
"Goodnight," Chloe whispered, and what those words meant if they had ever meant anything, she can't remember.  
  
Then, closer, "I love you," and that meant something, she was sure of it. It must because her fist tightened, when she heard it and her lungs constricted, breath caught in her chest. But looking at the half lidded eyes next to her, she couldn't remember, so she simply nodded, and exhaled as trained limbs moved over her and darkness like oblivion swept through her.  
  
That night she dreamed of blonde hair and blue eyes, which she washed away come morning. .

---

Okay so, yes, that was just weird. If nothing else I suppose this cements the fact that I am militant Kirika/Mireille supporter. Guess there's nothing left to do, but go find someplace to write that Kirika/Mireille smutty thing I wrote months ago.


	2. What Remains

The crickets won't sing to her tonight.

The sweat pools under Chloe's body while the night humidity collects around her like a fisherman's net, entangling her. It's too hot to do anything but wait for the songs that won't come.

But what's the matter if the crickets won't sing. Kirika is lying next to her; they are tangled together in this net of heat and stillness, and nothing could be more right.

She wishes she could tell Kirika things. If she could she would tell her that the weather is wrong for this time of year. That there is a stillness hangingin the airlike the moment before a storm.

But those words never fill anything but the silence. As much as she speaks, she never tells Kirika anything.

Chloe wishes she could tell her about the dreaming darkness where she spent planning for this moment. About the sleepless nights where she whispered into the dark and called Kirika to her.

She wishes she could tell Kirika that watching the assassination of the Boquet family was the first bright moment in a mind full of dark, lazy memories that mean nothing.

That her life had begun that night, and she waited for Kirika to come back to her so they could become Noir and her life could resume.

She wishes she could tell Kirika how happy she was when it came true. That the joy and love in her heart swelled so big she thought it would drown her, and she didn't even want to close her eyes at night for fear she would wake and find it all a dream.

But she never can.

Outside the crickets are silent but it doesn't matter. Kirika came back to her. She came back, and they are Noir. Life is as it should be, and Chloe will show Kirika that love can do more than always destroy.

-----

Althena's body the next morning doesn't surprise her like it should.

Why should it when even Althena had told her this would happen. When she can so clearly remember the sunlight and love hug Althena wrapped her in, and her soft murmurs as Chloe listened and cried little girls tears that should have had no place in their world.

"Don't cry. It all comes to death in the end."

It still hurts though, and she's glad for it when through the stinging red in her eyes, she sees Kirika standing to the side, waiting.

Kirika dismantles and reassembles her gun. Chloe hears the click of the safety being released before she realizes that Kirika has pushed the gun into her hands. That it is her fingers on the trigger.

She's never been fond of firing weapons. They are Kirika's, not her own. But suddenly the weight of it just feels right in her hands.

Kirika is waiting.

They are partners, friends, lovers.

More than anything else they are killers.

This is why she doesn't say, not now, not ever, "Don't you miss her?"

It's why she doesn't say, "Those bastards, we'll kill them."

Chloe hands Kirika her knife, and says "Let's go."

-------

They kill. They hunt and prey and stalk. Soldat's minions fall, their associates fall. Everyone they go up against they shatter.

She makes love to Kirika through the burst of the gun, and climaxes at the click of empty casing being released. She tells her everything she needs to through the sound flesh rending, and tearing. They fly past each other mid-kick, against each other mid-turn, and she thinks they understand each other completely.

However afterwards, in the between times, between shot and scream, it's mostly silent.

Chloe never asks, "Why?"

Kirika never says "Nothing else is left."

They sleep together in whatever shelter they can find. Chloe usually showers if possible, but Kirika doesn't bother unless Chloe insists. And she does that less and less as time goes on. Kirika's skin has an almost permanent flush about her. She smells like fever and death. Like sweat, and gun powder, and blood.

"Do you think there was ever another way this could have ended," she asks Kirika one night.

She doesn't expect an answer, doesn't want one, so when Kirika leans closer, so close that Chloe can feel the blood pounding, her pace quickens.

"We need more ammo," she says, and tosses the cartridges on the ground.

It's the first thing Kirika has said in over a week.

Kirika is not human. Chloe knows this. Kirika is many things. She is an angel to be worshipped. A force of nature to be feared. And if she lost something in becoming that, then it is already gone.

The only thing Chloe doesn't know is where she fits into this myth writing itself around them. Before she was an assassin, half of noir, a killer. But she was still a girl. She was still alive. Now, she's not so sure.

Kirika eyes catch on Chloe's and for a second there's some sliver of something forgotten.

"So fast", she whispers. Chloe may be the second best assassin in the world, but it still takes her a moment to realize Kirika's hand is now resting on her chest. On her heart.

One upon a time she thought her love for Kirika would save her. Why she thought that she doesn't remember, but she still believes it in some desperately serene corner of her mind.

She loved what Kirika used to be because that girl was strong, and brave, and she had grown into a friend during those long dreaming nights. She loved Althena because she taught Chloe love, showed her affection when she had no right to deserve any.

If Chloe thought about it she might think she loves the dark shadow where Kirika used to be because it is the only thing left. She doesn't think on it though. She loves the Kirika she has now without knowing why. Without needing to know. Without wanting to.

"They're coming," the shadows say softly.

"Yes," she whispers, and there is no click of the safety this time because it was never on to begin with.

Chloe grips her gun tighter, and turns around.

This too will end in death.

She thinks she's looking forward to that.


End file.
